1- A long time ago i saw on live website ( not in TF ) some effects and after a while i saw an author ( in TF ) using this effects and it’s the main effects for his template ( maybe it’s the only template using this effect in TF ).

2- Also i saw an author published his unique template and another author copied his design with small modification ( fonts & colors ) and both now in TF. ( where is DMCA ?? )

3- Today i saw a thread that one author send DMCA because another author copied his plugin design and the item is removed.

little confusion but :

What if i make the same case 1 design so what will happen to my item, will it be removed ?? ( can’t make any modification ).

I guess the most important aspect of DMCA takedowns is that they are manual. The person whose copyright was infringed has to make an effort to contact the site to have the offending item removed. In case 1, maybe the original site was unaware of the template on Themeforest, and therefore didn’t file a DMCA request. It is possible that they don’t care if their design was copied (maybe they themselves copied it from somewhere else, or the original designer gave blanket permission for anyone to copy it).

Case 2 it is hard to say that another design is a copy, since so many designs look alike these days. It is similar to cars. A Toyota looks very much like a Honda or a Nissan, and it is not worth pursuing a copyright claim. Pretty much all cars will have 4 wheels, 2-5 doors, a steering wheel, etc. Now if you made a 5 wheel car with a joystick instead of steering wheel and someone copied it you might have an easier time in court. For themes, you will not be able to convince a court that your responsive metro theme with a slider and portfolio was the first to use that design and someone else copied it, unless the source code is clearly the same. For this reason, even if someone does copy your design and you know about it, it is not worth doing a DCMA claim.

Case 3 the item was removed only because one author filed the claim. I bet you the most likely outcome is that the item will be back with no changes, because it will be hard to prove copying, especially if the code is different.

fillerspace said
I guess the most important aspect of DMCA takedowns is that they are manual. The person whose copyright was infringed has to make an effort to contact the site to have the offending item removed. In case 1, maybe the original site was unaware of the template on Themeforest, and therefore didn’t file a DMCA request. It is possible that they don’t care if their design was copied (maybe they themselves copied it from somewhere else, or the original designer gave blanket permission for anyone to copy it).

this one i can agree with you

fillerspace said
Case 2 it is hard to say that another design is a copy, since so many designs look alike these days. It is similar to cars. A Toyota looks very much like a Honda or a Nissan, and it is not worth pursuing a copyright claim. Pretty much all cars will have 4 wheels, 2-5 doors, a steering wheel, etc. Now if you made a 5 wheel car with a joystick instead of steering wheel and someone copied it you might have an easier time in court. For themes, you will not be able to convince a court that your responsive metro theme with a slider and portfolio was the first to use that design and someone else copied it, unless the source code is clearly the same. For this reason, even if someone does copy your design and you know about it, it is not worth doing a DCMA claim.

this one totally not agree because the author send DMCA but i don’t know what happen because he didn’t replay to my email to tell me what happen it’s like Toyota and Toyoti only changing letters nothing more but in this case only code.

fillerspace said
Case 3 the item was removed only because one author filed the claim. I bet you the most likely outcome is that the item will be back with no changes, because it will be hard to prove copying, especially if the code is different.

in this one the whole confusion because he filed the claim and the code is difference, in last few days i saw templates removed because of the same design but different in the code and that’s make case 2 conflict with case 3.

Keep in mind that the person filing the DMCA doesn’t have to prove anything to get the item taken down. They just have to make an accusation and the file is removed immediately. The idea behind this is that if you didn’t know you were infringing someone’s copyright (e.g. I post a cell phone video of someone performing a song in a subway tunnel, and the record company files a claim), you can remove the content and the matter goes away. Or, if you know you are infringing but you are trying to profit from it anyway (e.g. posting warez and earning ad revenue), you can just remove the content to avoid legal action.

Now, if you choose to contest the claim, it means you have a case (the person filing the DMCA is mistaken, and you can prove it), the content can go back up unless the other party wants to take it to court. This is case 2 and 3 above. In case 2 even if one author sees another author with the same design, it is going to be hard to prove one copied the other, so you can file a DMCA claim, but you will not have enough to go to court, so the item would just be back up in a few weeks anyway, so why even file the claim unless you think the other person will be scared enough to back off. In case 3 maybe the author wants to file the DMCA claim to scare the person or at least cause a few weeks of lost sales, but I doubt it is worth taking to court. It might cost hundreds or thousands to go to court, and that is more than could be won in the case anyway.